


in the darkness hide

by jdphoenix



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, Season/Series 01, Tattoos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-15
Updated: 2016-10-15
Packaged: 2018-08-22 14:55:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8289889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdphoenix/pseuds/jdphoenix
Summary: Jemma has a tattoo.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is definitely a drabble, not a full fic, but it got a little longer than I like posting straight to tumblr - and a little sexier too - so it's here instead.
> 
> For the prompt "lilac."

“What is _that_?” Skye demands, suddenly very alert for someone who was half-asleep only a second ago. She’s clumsy - comes with being drunk - as she pushes herself up on the couch and points one wobbly finger across the lounge.

“What?” Grant asks. He’s currently nursing a pleasant buzz and unless something explodes or appears to be an obvious threat, he’s gonna hold onto it as long as possible. He lets his eyes drift lazily after Skye’s finger. She’s not pointing at Fitz or his snoring, and the only one in the kitchen is Simmons, who’s trying to reach the top shelves to see if May’s replenished her not-so-secret candy stockpile. Not really anything in there to see.

Until you see it anyway.

Which Grant does when Simmons makes a little jump and her sweater lifts up, exposing a dark shape on her lower back. It’s not light enough to be a shadow and too uniform to be a bruise. It’s gotta be a-

“You have a _tattoo_?” Skye shrieks. The note she hits cuts cleanly through Grant’s buzz, but Fitz only sniffs and curls deeper into his armchair.

Simmons’ heels hit the tile and her reaching hand flies to her back, tugging her sweater down. “What?” she asks, all innocence.

Skye’s legs knock into Grants as she stumbles past him. He bites down a curse and lets her pass.

“You have a tattoo!” Skye says again, no less loudly but at least not high enough to shatter a man’s skull. “Lemme see!”

“No!” Simmons twists herself into the corner of the kitchen while Skye grabs for her. She looks genuinely scared to show it off and Grant finds himself on his feet before he’s even made the conscious decision to put a stop to this.

“Come on! I wanna see! Is it a guy’s name? Is it a girl’s? Is it something embarrassing? Lemme see!”

“No!” Simmons says firmly.

Grant’s hands settle on Skye’s hips before she can make another demand. He’s tired - from the mission and the alcohol both - and lets his chin rest on the top of her head to hold her. “Why don’t-” He frowns, realizes that talking while his jaw’s stuck in place is a bad idea, and adjusts his position before going on- “you ask her what it is? And if she wants us to know, she’ll say.”

Skye squirms but Grant holds her fast. “Fine. What is it.”

Simmons doesn’t look too happy about that lame attempt at a request, so Grant gives her a look he hopes conveys she should just answer so they can get to bed. She sighs.

“It’s a sprig of lilacs. For the month my grandmother was born.”

“Oh.” Skye’s enthusiasm is gone like it never was. She’s good at pretending talk about Simmons’ happy family life doesn’t bother her when she’s sober, but she hasn’t quite mastered it while drunk. “That’s not embarrassing at all.” She makes to turn away and Grant lets her, only to regret it when she turns right back. “Why didn’t you just say?”

Simmons shrugs one shoulder. “It’s … private. That’s all.”

“Oh. Sorry.” She sounds like she really means it. Her eyes meet Grant’s. “I’ll help Fitz to bed.”

She really must be sorry to do that. Grant’s usually gotta carry him. But he lets her go because he’s busy puzzling over the questions that have suddenly sprung to his own mind. He gives Simmons a friendly almost-smile, perfectly in character, and uses the excuse to give her a once-over.

Three years ago, back when he was still proving himself as one of SHIELD’s best, he got a crap assignment going undercover as a florist across the street from a bar owned and operated by the Irish mob. For the sake of his cover, he learned all sorts of useless information about flowers. To this day he knows the different meanings behind every shade of rose there is, including a few man-made ones. He also knows there are two different flower calendars - an English and an American version - and that neither has lilacs anywhere on them.

 

&&&&&

 

Grant doesn’t obsess about Simmons’ tattoo. He just … wonders.

It’s in her file, a little detail he didn’t even notice when he first looked into his teammates, but the note is conspicuously without a photo. There’s a faded scar on Grant’s knee from the time Christian pushed him in the lake. It’s twenty years old and barely visible, but SHIELD’s got a photo of it for identification purposes. The only thing in Simmons’ file is a brief description, exactly what she said that drunken night.

“Yeah, she’s really private about it,” is what Fitz says after Grant spends nearly an hour working his way around to the topic. “Won’t even let her boyfriends see, if you can believe that. She’s the reason that photostatic veil feels so much like real skin, you know.”

And after that, Grant’s _gotta_ see it. He pushes for missions in warmer climates in hopes of catching a glimpse, invites Simmons - and Fitz, to avoid looking suspicious - to join his training sessions with Skye, even sabotages the laundry detergent. Everyone, including him, loses half their wardrobes and it’s not even worth it because she seems to have an endless supply of those damn sweaters.

His curiosity burns at him in Providence. He tried to shut it away, along with all his feelings about the team, but while she fusses over his injuries, he sees he’s got one last shot. He can find a way to see the thing - see what it really is - and then he’ll get the hard drive unlocked. Easy.

Easi _er_ because Providence is a base built for hundreds with only the eight of them currently in residence, which means plenty of spare quarters to pull her into.

“Ward,” she gasps between kisses while their shirts come off. “We should talk about-”

“Later,” he lies. There won’t be a later, that’s the whole point.

“Your injuries,” she says as her hand slides along the top of one of the bandages.

“I know my limits.”

Her eyes snap open and her lust-drunk expression clears. Her eyebrows ask _really?_

He chuckles and slides his palm over her back, dipping his fingers past the waist of her jeans to cover the spot he knows her tattoo is hiding. She arches up into him and her teeth drag at her lower lip in a way that should be illegal.

“I’ll try,” he promises.

“Liar,” she sighs. For a second, he’s thrown. He doesn’t know why - it’s obvious she means it as a joke - but for just that second he feels like she really knows he’s completely full of shit. But then she’s kissing him and he lets it make him forget.

Not everything though. He remembers the point of this - other than the really good ending he can feel coming - while her ankles are around his waist and his hands are full of her ass and he’s already halfway to the bed. He leaves off paying attention to her breasts - something he’s definitely gonna have to get back to later, if only for the sounds she’s making - and drops her so he can turn her around.

She whines when he forces her legs down. She’s so damn wet for him, he’s not even gonna have to ask permission, all he’s gotta do is turn her and she’ll gladly-

Her hand catches his shoulder when he tries to move her where he wants her and her grip is _firm_.

“Really?” she asks.

“What?” He puts a little more stupid into his tone than he needs to, but he hopes she still sees him as that big, dumb specialist she saw on that first day - at least enough to sell it. He gestures between them, at their very naked bodies. “I thought we were … you know.”

She rolls her eyes which, the way she does it, also lifts her breasts in this really appealing way. He can see the beginnings of a bruise on the left one. She’ll be carrying that around for a few days at least.

“You thought if you seduced me, you’d get to see my tattoo,” she says sternly. “And you also failed to notice the mirror positioned conveniently behind me.”

His eyes snap up, from her chest to the reflection of her back.

There’s no tattoo. She’s wearing a veil. Dammit.

She smiles and turns her back on him. “Things like this,” she says to him in the mirror while her fingers pull delicately at the false skin, “are why I suggested we talk first.”

The veil comes away, revealing what is definitely not a sprig of lilacs.

“I was drunk,” she says, sounding amused and not at all ashamed. And he would’ve expected shame. Not for the drunken tattoo - though that too - but what it’s of. No loyal SHIELD agent would proudly show off their skull and tentacles tramp stamp a week after the uprising. Grant lifts his eyes to hers in the mirror again. He thinks, from her expression, she might be laughing at him. “Hail HYDRA.”

 


End file.
